Free Fry Me a Liver by Delia Rosen

trash.”
    â€œSome of it may be salvageable,” Bean said. “It will all be recovered for us to examine, then you can go through it—”
    â€œTwisted. Broken.” That was all I could think about. That horrid other worldly terrain with a coating of choking dust.
    â€œDetective Daniels called to ask how you were,” Bean told me. “He wanted to know if you needed anything.”
    â€œA new deli,” I said. That was harsh and I added more politely, “That was nice of him.”
    I didn’t want to think of Grant now. He was always strong when I needed him to be and strong when I didn’t need him to be. I didn’t want him on my mind or even peripherally back in my life. “What do we know?” I asked.
    â€œNot much. We can save the official interview until later, but can you give me a once-over from your end?”
    I told her I knew as little as she did since the blast knocked me silly and made my sensory perceptions meaningless. Bean nodded with what seemed to be understanding.
    â€œDo you think Tootsie Pearl was the target?” I asked. “Is she okay?”
    â€œShaken but uninjured.” Bean cocked her head toward a clutch of squad cars up the street. “We’re talking to her now.”
    I looked over. I saw the police talking to witnesses and keeping two layers of people back: journalists and gawkers taking cell phone videos, and people who were just trying to get through or go to their jobs. To her credit or damnation, I wasn’t sure which, Candy Sommerton was among the former, inscrutable and ghoulish, chasing the story. She was trying to talk to the police while other reporters were trying to talk to her, looking at their cell phones—at her video, I suspected. To add to the confusion, reporters were trying to interview the bloodied, limping reporter while she was trying to get to the mayoral candidate. The press refers to such events as a “media circus.” A circus has a ringleader and some sense of order. From where I stood, it looked like the monkey house at the Bronx Zoo.
    â€œThere were no death threats against the candidate that I’m aware of,” Bean confided to me. Her answer to the question confused me at first. I had forgotten what I’d asked. “We’re checking the social media sites now but—I’m told you have a kind of eagle eye on your place. True?”
    â€œI guess so,” I said. “When I look out at the diner, it’s like a rabbi on the High Holy Days, gratefully spotting worshipers who came every Sabbath, not just once a year, but aware of the rest.”
    She smiled. “So, Rabbi Katz. Did anyone look out of place?”
    â€œEveryone was eating, if that’s what you mean,” I said. “I got the Homeland Security circular about profiling that was called something else. No one stood out.”
    I had, in fact, dutifully read the document Homeland Security sent every six months. It was a PDF brochure called If You See Something, Say Something and it was sent to all public service institutions. The document said in big red letters that it was wrong to profile people because of their race, religion, nationality, dress, or accent. But, that said, it advised us of behavior to look out for such as patrons being overly protective of property that did not appear to have any obvious value; seeming agitated without any direct cause, such as someone talking loudly nearby; wearing heavy clothing that seemed inappropriate to temperate weather—all the things that anyone with a healthy strain of paranoia should spot without help from the federal government.
    â€œWho was the person down there with you?” She checked her iPad notes. “Benjamin West?”
    â€œA restaurateur from Southern California. Said he was sampling local cuisine with his girlfriend.”
    â€œAnything suspicious about him?”
    â€œOnly his taste in food, Tex-Asian